Summer projects are a great way for students to stay sharp during their long hiatus from school. The summer should be a time for students to relax and explore their passions without having to worry about schoolwork too much. But they should still have a few projects to do over the break so when they get back to school in Autumn, teachers don't waste time reviewing material their students have already learned. I believe these projects should be teacher designed so they stick to the curriculum the teachers want to teach, so students can get used to their new teachers assignments before the year starts, and so the students can have more structure.

Teachers should design summer projects so they can follow their curriculum as close as they want. If the projects were designed by students, they might not cover what the teacher intended to cover. In fifth grade, my teacher told us to do a project on whatever we wanted. The only guideline was that we had to present our findings to the class in some way. The variety of the projects was immense. However, this did not bother my teacher because her goal was to get us used to doing research projects before we went to middle school. While it may have seemed as if we, the students, were designing out own project, we were really doing the teacher designed project of practicing research. Another time, in tenth grade chemistry, our teacher told us for the end of year project to do whatever we wanted. She never specified that it had to relate to chemistry, even though it was implied. So when it came time to present our projects, a group of boys went up to the front of the class and started explaining the rules of spikeball. When asked what spikeball had to do with chemistry they said they did not know the project had to be related to chemistry. Confusion like this is easily caused when the teacher does not design the project and leaves it up to the students. That is why if the teacher wants to stick to their curriculum, they should be in charge of designing summer projects, not students.

Summer projects should be a way for students to get used to the type of work they will be doing with a certain teacher in the future. If the students design their own projects, they will not be introduced to their teachers style of assessment until the beginning of the year and will have a harder time on the first few assignments in that class. My ninth grade history teacher was very different compared to any teacher I had before. The first project he assigned was very tricky and I did not really know what to do. I ended getting a bad grade on it but I eventually got used to his project style later on in the year. If he had given us a project designed by him over the summer I would have been more prepared for the first real projects of the year. On the other hand, my ninth grade English teacher gave us a summer reading project of her own creation that really helped at the beginning of the year. By completing that assignment, I was prepared for the year because the reading got me used to the workload of the class, and the project got me ready for future similar reading projects that we did every month. If every teacher assigned a manageable project, designed by themselves, every student would com into that class at the beginning of the year prepared and comfortable with all their assigned projects.

If teachers create summer projects, rather than students, it gives the students much more structure which is vital for kids, especially at a younger age. It is important for kids in elementary and middle school to have the leadership of a teacher to rely on. At that age, I hated when teachers gave us total freedom on projects because I would not know what they expected me to do. I needed them to guide me and tell me what the expected out of me, then I would go achieve that. But without explicit directions as a kid, I would struggle to decide what to do to please my teachers. However, in high school, it is better to give students more freedom because in their careers they will not always have someone telling them what to do every step of the way and they will have to think for themselves. But, it is not smart to give students complete freedom as they will have someone who wants something specific out of them when they get a job. For example, when I got my first job at an ice cream store I had to figure things out myself as I went, but I could not just do whatever I wanted. I had a task to complete that was specified by my boss, but he was not there every step of the way and left me to figure some things out on my own. That is what summer projects should emulate for high school students, while projects should be much more structured for younger kids.

Summer projects are great for students and teachers alike, but should be teacher-designed because that way it is easier to follow a specific curriculum, it gets the students used to the teaching style of their new teacher, and it gives students more structure in general. All these reasons are very helpful for students and can not be achieved by student-designed projects. That is why all summer projects should be designed strictly by teachers.